On standing firm
Search me, O God, and know my heart;
Test me and know my thoughts. Psalm 139:23
Read Luke 12:8—12
Perhaps I have been able to close the front door tonight and get out my prayer book and be quite secure against any challenge that would tempt me to deny my faith in Jesus. Perhaps this, at least, is a secure place. I’m not facing some inimical authority, some hostile mob demanding that I forsake Christ. Not here and now. But truly, I have not been able to shut out the enemy of Christ merely by shutting the door. Not even by switching off the TV or the phone. If I am tempted to fall away from Christ it is a testing and a tempting that is most likely to go with me even to the secret place, and especially this blaspheming against the Holy Spirit. It is within me, not outside, that I may decide to do life on my own, to shut out the Spirit’s real leading. I could keep my outward observance going and no one know that I had died inside.
Prayer
Dear Lord, my Lord and God, you let nothing stand in the way of laying down your life for me. You did not deny me. You did not deny, much as you felt the immensity of it and the temptation of it, you did not deny the Father’s consuming love for me. Now let me be utterly, utterly yours.